


grit your teeth; soldier on

by cliche_username



Category: ONF (Band), 믹스나인 | MIXNINE (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Self-Destructive Behavior, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, More Crying, ft. various cameos from mixnine, lightly edited i am no man
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-29
Updated: 2020-07-29
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:55:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25583977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cliche_username/pseuds/cliche_username
Summary: six times Seungjoon held on for his team and one time he let himself go.
Relationships: Kim Hyojin (ONF) & Lee Seungjoon | J-Us, OT7 - Relationship
Comments: 6
Kudos: 53





	grit your teeth; soldier on

They quickly learn that MIXNINE is fucking unforgiving. They don’t learn quickly enough.

The moment the director calls for the cameras to stop rolling for the night, Minseok is off his pedestal and tearing across the studio. Yuto and Minkyun are hot on his heels; Seungjoon is following, but his attention is caught by Hyojin stumbling on his way down. 

When he looks around, Jaeyoung is already at his shoulder. They stick with Hyojin - a precaution, more than anything, he’s upright and steady but Seungjoon knows he looks like death under the thick layer of stage makeup and resolve. They get out of the studio and into the waiting room to Changyoon when he’s already hedged in on three sides but not crying anymore. He cried onstage, when everyone but Minseokie got to “say goodbye”, but it wasn’t a lot. He looks a little more collected now, probably having taken the aching minutes and minutes between “Changyoon, eliminated” and “okay, cut!” to pull himself together. They know that their manager’s probably already been called to take him home, but first this:

Hyojin pushes forward just enough to break ranks with Seungjoon and Jaeyoung, pushes through the maknae line and puts his arms around Changyoon’s shoulders. Changyoon drops his head onto Hyojin’s shoulder and sighs. 

“You’ve done well,” Seungjoon hears Hyojin say as he arrives. “You’ve done well. You’ve made us proud. It’s a bad turnout but it’s not your fault.” Changyoon sniffles. Seungjoon and Jaeyoung make it the rest of the way forward to shore up the wall around them, and when Changyoon’s settled enough to walk they walk him out. Back to the cars, back to the hotel, back to the dorms. Hyojin staggers on the walk back to the elevator and protests when Seungjoon gets one arm under his shoulders to hold him up, but protests even more when Jaeyoung volunteers to carry him. (Jaeyoung  _ \- Jaeyoung.  _ Who’s already wept for losing half his team tonight but is steady now, a ballast for his team to fall back on. Where the fuck would they be without Shim Jaeyoung.) Seungjoon stays where he is. 

When they get to Changyoon’s dorm, Maknae line + Jaeyoung take over packing Changyoon’s things while Minkyun sits with Changyoon and Hyojin nearly falls asleep on Seungjoon’s shoulder. It briefly brings a bad taste to Seungjoon’s mouth, thinking how shitty the King-Jjang-Wang team looked and felt for so shitty a result. Third place for all their bloody feet. Seungjoon’s not ungrateful - he got a good result and his team is better off for it (don’t think about Chandong) - but Hyojin and Yuto and the others. Fuck.

It’s fucking unforgiving.

They walk Changyoon out to the car. Jaeyoung volunteers to carry Hyojin, is shot down, and carries Changyoon’s luggage instead. Changyoon is again trapped in a maknae line sandwich, both hands trapped in Minseok’s, but he’s still not crying when they get him to the car. 

Seungjoon hugs him goodbye and says, “You’ve done well. Get some sleep for the rest of us, alright?” 

When he says that, the corners of Changyoon’s mouth get a little tighter. He pulls his resolve back around him again and stands a little straighter. “I will,” he says. “And so help me if any of you die I’ll come right down to hell and kick your asses.” He looks around at them all, steadier, and Minkyun grins.

“Hell yeah,” he says. “We’d deserve it, too. Wish us luck?”

Changyoon tells them all  _ fighting  _ and  _ stay alive  _ and gets in the car.  _ He’s  _ gonna sleep in a real bed tonight. The rest of them have a whole day of shit left to do, but first Seungjoon walks Hyojin backs up to the dorms and threatens to kick his ass (and tell Donghun) if he doesn’t get at least a few hours of sleep. Then he goes back to his own pathetic excuse for a mattress, falls face forward onto it, and passes the hell out.

He holds.

He’s in practice when Hyojin barges into the room and bellows, “ _ ONF!” _ so loudly it startles him over the thumping of the music. He freezes in place long enough that someone else collides with him, and then he breaks formation and crosses to the door. Jaeyoung is already there, and Hyojin is already saying, “Yuto.” Something cold pools in the pit of Seungjoon’s stomach. He follows Hyojin out the door and finds himself falling in step behind Jaeyoung, behind Hyojin, behind the trim outline of Minseok’s shoulders already at the end of the hall. Minseokie rounds the corner and Hyojin’s just behind him, and when Seungjoon arrives they’re gathered around Minkyun and Minkyun has Yuto wrapped in his arms. Yuto’s head is resting on Minkyun’s chest and his face is blotchy with tears. 

Seungjoon feels cold.

Hyojin loops around and catches Yuto around the middle, and Minseok finds Yuto’s hand, and they murmur things Seungjoon can’t make out. Jaeyoung reaches around Minkyun and greets Yuto with another murmur, and Yuto mumbles something back. Seungjoon steps around them and finds Yuto’s other hand as Yuto says, “I don’t know why I’m trying anymore. It’s not going to change anything.”

“Not true,” Minkyun hums, rubbing a circle into his back. “You’ve done so well. You’re making us all proud. That’s the most important thing.”

Seungjoon feels like he’s missed a step on the way down-stairs and is stumbling through open air. He hates that he only knows now that Yuto’s struggling. He hates that he - and Hyojin and Jaeyoung - had to be fetched in a moment of crisis, hates that there’s no telling the next time they’ll all be able to rally as a team and not as competitors. Wasn’t that the scariest thing from the beginning? Not knowing whether he’d look at his own group and see friends or rivals?

They reconfigure and Seungjoon winds up with his arms around Yuto’s waist and his chin over Yuto’s shoulder, drying his tears from behind with the end of his shirtsleeve. Jaeyoung rumbles more reassurances, Minkyun concurs, they shore their second maknae up with words and hugs and slowly the tears trickle to a stop. They tell him the truth: that he makes them proud every day. They tell him another truth: that it’s not over ‘til it’s over. Every minute left over is a chance to keep going. It’s a rich statement coming from three teammates who are so much further up the ranks it’s embarrassing, and Seungjoon wants to leave the stupid red vests in a corner and not bring them out again til he’s back to his “team”, but he ignores the feeling. He ignores the vests and the ranks and tries to just for a moment be Yuto’s leader. Like it’s just another crummy eval and they’ll work harder and do better next week and it’ll be fine.

He holds.

And what the fuck is the point, as he’s sheepish for getting knocked down a peg or four and Minkyun and Yuto are sent home. He doesn’t like the bitter taste in his mouth when he thinks that this is the second time that someone has told Minkyun he’s not good enough with an army of cameras and the whole world watching. Yeah, Seungjoon made it, Jaeyoung made it, Minseokie made it, Hyojin fucking landed  _ first place, _ but - ?

They walk Minkyun and Yuto out to the car, a ritual that now feels redundant. Minseok carries Yuto’s luggage and Yuto leans on Minseok’s shoulder. Minkyun is strung up between Seungjoon and Hyojin, and he’s not crying. He’s not smiling, either, but he seems steady. 

They get to the van, and Jaeyoung dumps Minkyun’s luggage and Minseok dumps Yuto’s and Changyoon climbs out to pass around another round of hugs. He tells Yuto, “welcome to the party that gets to sleep,” and that gets a weak little chuckle out of him. 

Seungjoon hugs Minkyun goodbye and mumbles into his shoulder, “you haven’t cried on us yet, it’s a miracle.” Minkyun snorts.

“I’m saving that for when I get devastatingly drunk tonight,” he replies. “Or maybe tomorrow night. Gotta get that sleep in first, you know.”

“I don’t,” Seungjoon replies, and that gets a laugh. “You  _ know  _ I don’t,” and Minkyun laughs again. 

“Kick ass for us,” he tells Seungjoon, and Seungjoon nods, because what else could he do? 

“You’re cheering for us at the final, right?” he asks, and Minseok pipes up,

“Yeah, hyungs, you’re cheering for us, right?”

“Of course we are,” Minkyun says, “We gotta make sure you make ONF proud, don’t we?”

“We don’t even need to worry about that,” Minseok says, “you already have.”

“Shut up,” Minkyun says, and gives Minseok another hug. “Shut up. Dammit.” He lets go and scrubs at his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, I’ve fuckin’... made ONF proud. And worked hard. That’s how it goes, right?”

“You’ve made ONF proud and worked hard,” everyone else responds back, not in perfect unison, but close. 

“Hell yeah,” Minkyun says, and then he cries a little, but he gives everyone one more hug and gets in the van and drags Yuto halfway into his lap. Changyoon and the manager take them home. Now it’s just four of them, Jaeyoung with a little pinch at the corners of his mouth and Minseok’s brightness dimmed just a little and Hyojin a little shy in his triumph, and Seungjoon, well, himself. 

He holds.

He fails.

Later they’ll tell him he ranked really well at the last, tenth or eleventh or something cute like that, but in the moment he just shakes the bitter taste out of his mouth and runs to Hyojin - Hyojin, who as soon as the cameras pulled away and the confetti dropped burst into tears. He runs into Byeongkwan first, and  _ holy shit, Byeongkwan,  _ and gives him a hug, but he can see Hyojin just there, a little stiff in Seyoon’s arms. He lets Byeongkwan go and reaches, and Hyojin collapses into him. Seyoon says something, but Seungjoon misses it in the haste of saying to Hyojin, “You did it, you did it, you made it, you’ve worked hard.” 

Hyojin sobs into his shoulder, once, twice, three times, and breathes deep and pulls away. He offers Seungjoon a watery little smile, and Seungjoon smiles back. “You’ve worked hard,” he says, “you’ve made ONF proud,” and Hyojin nods, and then he pulls away. Seungjoon begins to protest, but Hyojin only moves the few steps past Hyunseok to fall into Jaeyoung’s arms. That’s alright. Jaeyoung holds him, and says something Seungjoon can’t hear over the roar, and good. Seungjoon finds himself caught with Jinyoung and Hyunseok and a bunch of  _ well done, well done, congratulations,  _ but when he looks back Jaeyoung and Hyojin are still there. 

“Hyung,” someone says next to him, and it’s Minseokie, bright, wonderful Minseokie, and Seungjoon hugs him and shouts how proud he is right in Minseok’s ear, and Minseokie just laughs. 

“Come on,” Seungjoon says then, “Hyojinie’s crying still,” and elbows his way through to grab Hyojin around the waist. It’s a moment before Minseok makes his way through - the darling of MIXNINE, no one is surprised - and Seungjoon tugs at Hyojin just enough to get him to let Jaeyoung go.

“Hyung,” Minseok says again, then, and Hyojin reels him in, reels them all in, and they all slump together for a long moment. Two winners, two… well, technically losers. Hyojin and Minseok are going to leave them behind in a few months to do even more amazing MIXNINE things and the rest of ONF will have to stay home and cheer them on, and Seungjoon has to shake off how terrified that makes him. Sure, they’ve been on separate teams for five months, but they were always nearby. Sure, Hyojin has been steadily outranking him since the beginning, but there was always the assurance that he was  _ there. _

Seungjoon holds them, and then he and Hyojin make their (teary) triumphant lap around the stage as the music keeps playing, and they hug a bunch more people - winners and losers alike - and Seungjoon holds. They wave frantically across the studio at the others, who wave gaudy ONF banners back at them, and Seungjoon holds.

It turns out that it’s a fucking miracle they all made it through, and even all the way out of the studio and down a flight of stairs, before Minseok fucking passes out. It’s brief - first Minseok is laughing, and then he’s falling, and then he’s in Yuto’s arms and Yuto is calling for help, and then Minseok is lying on the ground and manager is checking his pulse when he opens his eyes again.

“What happened?” He asks, and six anxious bandmates let out a relieved sigh of thank-fuck-he-doesn’t-have-brain-damage (probably). Manager says,

“You passed out. When was the last time you ate?” and hands him a water bottle. 

Minseok sits up slowly and takes a long drink from the water bottle and doesn’t look at anyone. Seungjoon feels vaguely horrified for a moment, and Manager says, “Minseokie.”

“I was too nervous to get lunch, and we were shooting at dinnertime,” Minseok mumbles. Six people sigh in both relief and exasperation. Manager pulls out a meal bar and shoves it into Minseok’s free hand.

“Eat,” he says, “Stupidhead.”

“I’m sorry,” Minseok mumbles. He takes another long drink of water and opens the bar, and Manager gets up. Jaeyoung takes his place on the floor.

“Can you walk to the car?” He asks.

“Probably,” Minseok says.

“No, Jaeyoung,” Seungjoon says, before Jaeyoung can say anything else. His voice comes out weary, but not sharp, which is good. “You’re worn the hell out yourself. No carrying the maknae.” Jaeyoung scowls at him, but doesn’t argue. Minkyun volunteers, and they boost Minseok onto his back and Hyojin takes the water bottle but not the meal bar. Minseok takes a few bites of it and then drops his head onto Minkyun’s shoulder as they make their way out of the station, out to the van. They’ve been packed since this morning - well, haven’t really been unpacked since prep for finals started, aside from pulling clothes from their suitcases and putting clothes back in again. It was just a matter of making sure the suitcases were closed and dragging them down to the cars before broadcast, and that means that now they just pile into the van and set course for home.

Seungjoon winds up next to Jaeyoung, and the moment the van door closes Jaeyoung collapses in on himself and puts his head in his hands. He doesn’t look to be crying (yet): his shoulders move up and down steadily, like he’s trying to breathe as long and deep as he can. Seungjoon unclenches his hands from his seat belt and gently rubs a circle in Jaeyoung’s back.

“You’ve done well,” he says. “I don’t know where we’d have been without you. You’ve been incredible. You’ve made us all proud. Hell, you’ve probably made all of Korea proud. Anyone who’s ever watched MIXNINE knows now that Shim Jaeyoung is an amazing human being.”

“That’s right!” Minkyun chirps from the backseat. “And you can’t forget they think you’re handsome, too.”

“Shim Jaeyoung is the Nation’s Muscles,” Minseok chimes in.

“Yah,” Minkyun says, “Shut up and eat your meal bar.”

“I finished it.”

Jaeyoung’s shoulders shake a little, but he lifts his head and he’s laughing. “Thanks,” he says. “I’m okay. I’m just exhausted.” Seungjoon thumps him on the back, and again for good measure. Jaeyoung drops his head on Seungjoon’s shoulder as if in retribution, and they go home. Seungjoon has to wake Jaeyoung when they get there.

He holds.

It feels really, really fucking good to troop back up the stairs to their silly little dorm. Yuto unlocks the door and they all file in and holy  _ shit _ , they’re  _ home,  _ they’re not sleeping in impersonal hotel rooms with seven or nine other guys tonight, this is  _ their  _ dorm and their shoe rack to kick their shoes off on and their floor to drop their suitcases on unceremoniously and that Minseok throws himself face-first onto. Hyojin fusses Jaeyoung towards the shower first, and the has-been-sleeping line goes into the kitchen yelling three or four things about food at once. Hyojin ruffles Minseok’s hair and warns him to stay awake long enough for more food, and then disappears into his room.

It’s over.

They’re finished.

Seungjoon forces himself to move before he loses all the strength in his legs. Into his room, close the door. He fumbles for the lightswitch and when he finds it, flips it on, he’s struck by how  _ stupidly  _ normal everything is. The other beds have been slept in. His own shit is probably in the exact same place it was five months ago, when he rushed through to pack and rushed out again. It looks messy enough.

He’s probably going to have nightmares about waking up for practice.

He strips off his blazer and shirt and slacks and leaves them in a pile. He’ll hang them up later, or maybe they’ll get sent back to YG, or something. They can’t use the badge again, can they? It has his name on it. Seungjoon wants to frame it, or maybe burn it. He steps away from the pile and digs in his dresser for a clean pair of sweats. Every step towards normality is a loosening of the tight knot of stress energy in his chest; he feels himself drooping even further as he pulls on sweatpants and a t-shirt that he’s probably had since high school.

He’s so fucking tired. He wonders if he can sleep for five minutes before Changyoon and Yuto and Minkyun finish up whatever the hell they’re doing in the kitchen. 

He kicks the pile of MIXNINE knockoff-schoolboy threads out of his way and opens the door again. Hyojin looms on the other side - well, not really looms, but - 

“Ai, you startled me,” Seungjoon says, when he has words again. Hyojin looks a bit more himself now: in sweats and a t-shirt like Seungjoon, barefaced, hair ruffled where he’s disturbed it. He also looks exhausted, because he probably is, and he’s broken out, which has probably been stressing him all day. He’s gone from MIXNINE CENTER KIM HYOJIN to just… Kim Hyojin. Seungjoon’s best friend.

“I wanted to check on you,” Hyojin says. “You’ve held out really well, but I wanted to make sure.”

_ What kind of leader would I be if I ruined the atmosphere for everyone else? _ Seungjoon remembers saying, five fucking months ago. They’d filmed him getting on the bus that night, but then he’d gotten right the hell back off again and one of their managers had rushed him to the hospital. He doesn’t remember, now, when he’d managed to sleep that night.

“I’m good,” Seungjoon says. “Exhausted, but I’m pretty sure everyone is. Speaking of, you look like shit.”

Hyojin smacks his shoulder. “Thanks. You still look halfway like a human being, you should get rid of the lies like the rest of us.”

“I was getting there.” Seungjoon rubs his eyes and feels some of the makeup come off.  _ Seungjoon-ssi be careful mind your makeup! _ “I’m going to be dreaming about this shit for weeks, I know it.”

“You weren’t already?” Hyojin sounds surprised. He’s probably been having nightmares for weeks, because he’s Kim Fucking Second Place Hyojin. Seungjoon shrugs.

“Hasn’t set in yet, probably,” he says. “What, you have?”

Hyojin shrugs. “Adjusting was hard.”

It was. Maybe Seungjoon should consider himself lucky to have been able to sleep at all. “You played it off pretty well.”

Hyojin shrugs, and then he frowns. “Are you sure you’re alright?”

Seungjoon opens his mouth to deflect, and closes it again. Then he says, “Are any of us?”

Hyojin’s frown gets a little more pronounced. Then he steps into the room, pulls the door gently from Seungjoon’s hand, and closes it. He and Seungjoon stare at each other - one, two, three beats - and then Hyojin takes a deep breath and hugs him. 

He slumps, a little, and hugs Hyojin back, and Hyojin pulls him in tighter. It feels strong. Hyojin’s always been strong - he’s always been a fucking shrimp, they both have, but strong. Always strong enough to hold Seungjoon together when he’s felt like falling apart. 

That’s it.

“Fuck,” he mumbles into Hyojin’s shoulder. “Fuck, fuck,  _ fuck.” _ Hyojin hums acknowledgement and one of his thumbs rubs a tiny circle against Seungjoon’s shoulder blade. “ _ Fuuuuuuck,”  _ Seungjoon groans, and reminds himself to breathe, all the way in, all the way out, because it feels abruptly like he’s going to drop. “I’m so tired, Hyojinie,” he mumbles.

“You’ve worked hard,” Hyojin replies. “You’ve made ONF proud. I don’t know if I’ve actually said it, Seungjoonie, but you have been incredible.”

The knot in Seungjoon’s chest unravels. He breathes in, breathes out, and his breath stutters into a sob. Then another, and another, and then he’s just standing there crying while Hyojin fusses with his hair and rubs the back of his neck.

“I hated that I had to think of you as competition,” he says into Hyojin’s shoulder. “I hated that there was always some way for the show to tell me you were so much better than me. Out of my league. And I mean - you were amazing. Are amazing. You earned it. But it was weird to not be by your side.”

“I wished you weren’t in the top9 so I could choose you,” Hyojin whispered. “I wished you could have stayed with the Stand By Me team. I know it gave you a better chance -” Seungjoon snorts - “but I wish it didn’t have to. I wanted to work alongside you, even just once.”

“Maybe I should have stayed,” Seungjoon says. “It’s not like leaving did me any favors.” Fourth. Tenth. Eliminated. Could he have saved himself if he hadn’t chose to leave Hyojin? Or would choosing Hyojin have screwed him over even worse? Would he have gone home with Minkyun and Yuto? Would it have mattered, in the end?

“That’s thinking too much,” Hyojin says. “It’s done. We’re done. You worked hard. I’m pretty sure I only won because half of Korea thought I was handsome.”

“You are,” Seungjoon says.

“Well, yes, but that doesn’t make me better than anyone else. I think if we were going off of actual talent Yuto would have smoked us all.”

Seungjoon tastes bitterness. “Damn right.”

He barely hears the sounds of footsteps before the door opens into Hyojin’s back. Yuto yelps an apology from the other side. 

“Hyungs,” he says, “We made ramen?”

Seungjoon looks like shit. He’s been crying all over Hyojin. If he goes in there, they will all know he’s been crying all over Hyojin. Yuto has probably realized already.

“Thank you, Yuto-gah,” Hyojin says, “we’ll be there in a moment.” Seungjoon sniffles, and Yuto mumbles a small  _ okay  _ before closing the door.

“It’s over,” Hyojin says. “You don’t have to be the unbreakable leader anymore, you know.”

Does he?

Seungjoon pulls away and scrubs at his face. He’s probably taking off as much makeup as tears. “Okay,” he says. “Fine. But if someone else starts crying because I was crying, it’s your fault.”

Hyojin snorts. “Sure, Seungjoonie.”

He tucks Seungjoon under one arm and they go. As soon as Seungjoon and his face full of tears enters the room, Minseok makes a sad noise and plasters himself to Seungjoon’s other side.

“You’ve done well, hyung,” he says, and Seungjoon lets out a little watery laugh.

“We all have,” he says.

“Yeah,” Minseok says, “but you haven’t cried or passed out before, so it’s your turn to hear it.” He butts his head into Seungjoon’s chest. “You were amazing.”

“Yeah, don’t let it go to your head but you made us all proud,” Changyoon says. Seungjoon sniffles and smiles and Jaeyoung makes a pained  _ aiii  _ sound, and Hyojin releases him enough that the rest of them can squeeze in and take turns giving him hugs. Minkyun ruffles his hair and teases that they’re getting drunk together tomorrow. (Hyojin shoots that down under “the maknaes could get drunk too and that sounds like a terrible idea.”) Seungjoon laughs and cries in equal measure and eventually drops onto the kitchen floor when his knees give out, and Yuto brings him a bowl of ramen and squeezes under one of his arms.

Seungjoon drops his head against the kitchen cabinets and lets himself be relieved that it’s over, and he lost, but he didn’t really lose. They have their future. He has his best friend, and his team, and a nice bowl of ramen and the promise of sleeping in waiting for him.

He dries his eyes again and begins to eat.

**Author's Note:**

> I have been a fuse for approx. a week and a half and literally just finished watching mixnine all out of order, and the whole time I kept seeing things happening and thinking, "oh but what about--" these are all what-abouts, save that the Yuto bit did happen in an episode and there are fancams of Hyojin crying on Seungjoon during the finale. Those did mess me up. also the fact that MIXNINE split apart established teams and - in the case of ACE and ONF - made them rivals by their own merit. they were too good to be on teams together, which, damn. survival shows, damn. minkyun has gotten eliminated on survival shows twice, damn.
> 
> that's all thx for reading fam i'm @amberlizard on tumblr if anyone wants to say hi [finger guns]


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